Determination of health status perception and orthorexia nervosa tendencies of Turkish yoga practitioners: a cross- sectional descriptive study Özüm Erkin, Ilknur Göl 1 İzmir Democracy University, Faculty of Health Sciences, Nursing Department Turkey - E-mail: ozum.erkin@gmail.com; 2 Çankırı Karatekin Universty, Faculty of Health Sciences, Nursing Department Summary. As part of the yoga the possibility that excessive attention paid by practitioners to diet and food quality is expected. Tis study was aimed to determine health status perception and orthorexia nervosa tenden- cies of yoga practitioners. Tis cross-sectional descriptive study was conducted at three yoga centers in Izmir. Te population of the study consisted of 153 people registered in yoga centers between March and May 2017. Te data were collected using a personal information form (11 questions), Perception of Health Status Scale and Orthorexia Nervosa (Orto-11) Scale. While perceived physical health was “good” for 68.0% of the par- ticipants, the mean perceived health score was 1.94±0.54. Te mean score of Orto-11 Scale was 24.05±4.36. It was determined that the perceived health of those who were married and non-smoker were higher than the orthorexia tendencies of the individuals who were married and had the chronic illness (p<.001). More than half of yoga practitioners perceived their physical health as “good”. It was determined that the perceived health status of those who were married and non-smokers were higher. It was found that the vast majority of yoga practitioners was at risk in terms of orthorexia. Some factors like marital status and the presence of chronic illness signifcantly afected orthorexia nervosa tendencies of yoga practitioners. Key words: Orthorexia nervosa, yoga practitioners, health status, perception Progress in Nutrition 2019; Vol. 21, N. 1: 105-112 DOI: 10.23751/pn.v21i1.7664 © Mattioli 1885 Original article Introduction Nutritional intake is a physiological, sociological and psychological phenomenon (1). Orthorexia nervo- sa (ON) refers to a pathological obsession concerning healthy nutrition obsession or the desire to consume healthy food (2,3). Te term “orthorexia” was frst defned in a non-scientifc yoga journal by Bratman (1997) with joining the Greek words ‘orthos’ (correct, appropriate) and ‘orexia’ (appetite). Even though or- thorexia is similar to known eating disorders, consum- ing only “pure” and “healthy” foods are in the forefront in orthorexia rather than the desire to lose weight (2). Transformation of this desire to excessive efort mentally and behaviorally also resembles obsessive- compulsive disorder (4). It is stated that depression, anxiety, perfectionist tendencies and stress can accom- pany ON as in other eating disorders (5). While health promotion, treatment of a disease or loss of weight are the priorities in the basis of orthorexia, then this nutri- tion style starts to be the most important part in the lives of orthorectic individuals. Tus, they are hav- ing healthy eating obsession in order to protect and promote health (6). Obsessional behaviors related to orthorexia are related to the content of the food con- sumed rather than its’ amount (7). In the orthorexia nervosa, the person controls everything he/she eats ex- aggeratedly. He/she examines the package of the prod- ucts for hours and thinks hard exaggeratedly whether the product contains any carcinogenic substance, hor- mone, dye, and addictive substance (2,3). In this illness which can also lead to impaired social functioning, in-